Pelham Grenville Wodehouse, the British author of cultishly-popular humorous novels, short stories and plays (Jeeves and Bertie Wooster are probably his most famous fictional creations, and he worked on musicals with composers like George Gershwin and Jerome Kern) became unexpectedly controversial at the height of his popularity.

He was residing in France in 1940 when the Nazis over-ran the country. As a British citizen, he was interred as an enemy alien. The Nazis knew they had a prize catch, however, for Wodehouse was famous throughout the world, and they were anxious to use him for propaganda purposes. They transferred him to a prison in Berlin and made him an offer: he would be treated decently if he would just make a few pro-German radio broadcasts. He agreed to do so -- to save his skin, he would later say -- he would also claim that they were harmless broadcasts in which he simply joked about his imprisonment.

But he didn't anticipate the repercussions. After the war, the good-natured comic author was branded as a traitor and collaborator by most Britons. He was never actually tried for treason, but in effect he was "drummed out" of his native land.

He came to the U.S., eventually settling in Remsenburg, Long Island, where he resumed his interrupted literary output. He became a U.S. citizen in 1956 and was eventually forgiven and even knighted by Queen Elizabeth in 1975. He died in 1975 at the age of 94 and was buried in Remsenburg.

Why this history lesson? Well, my daughter and I were recently visiting the Hamptons, near Remsenburg, and decided we had to take time out to pay a respectful pilgrimage to P.G.'s gravesite.

Easier said than done. If you research it on the internet, you will learn that Wodehouse is buried in the "Historic Remsenburg Cemetery", and you will even find a photograph of his gravestone. Remsenburg is a small (but very affluent) town near the Hamptons -- we figured it would be a cinch to find the gravesite.

Three of us set out to do so -- me, my wife and our daughter -- one day this past July. Arriving in Remsenburg, we drove around the largely residential community for a short time, hoping to get lucky. We sighted no cemeteries and finally decided to ask directions at the Remsenburg Post Office. An elderly woman was just leaving the Post Office, carrying her mail -- obviously a local resident -- so we asked her for help (remember, Wodehouse was Remsenburg's most famous resident for many years). She said, oh, sure, he's buried in the "historic cemetery" and we could walk there from the Post Office. She gave us directions, we thanked her profusely and walked off, relieved that our quest would be over so easily.

In a few minutes we arrived at the cemetery, and, believe me, it was "historic". First of all, it was tiny, about the size of my living room/dining room area. And second, every stone there looked like it was from the Revolutionary War era. With one glance, it was obvious that P.G.'s gravestone was not going to be found there.

Dejected, we searched around the immediate area carefully, walking a few blocks in each direction to make sure we weren't missing anything. Then, back to the Post Office.

This time we went inside and spoke to the clerk (no other customers were around). She called her boss in from the back for additional help. They both agreed that Wodehouse HAD to be in the "historic cemetery". We assured them that he was not there and wondered if there were other cemeteries in the area. They couldn't think of any, but referred us to a community center across the street, where people might be able to help us. After more thank you's, we went across the street where we were lucky enough to find five people of various ages who were planning an upcoming social event. After we explained our quest to them, they went through the "historic cemetery" routine with us. When we explained that we just came from there, they began to seriously try to locate other cemeteries in town, using ancient wall maps that were hanging in the room.

Gathering all the info we could from the maps, and with many thanks, we continued on our way. To make a long story just a little shorter, in the end we couldn't locate any of the cemeteries that were indicated on those old wall maps -- don't know what happened to them, but they simply weren't where they were supposed to be.

By this time, we were getting antsy -- who needs this aggravation, it's only a gravesite! But a quest is a quest.

What we decided to do was drive out of town slowly, keeping a sharp lookout for anything that might hide a cemetery. We were at the point of giving up in defeat, when we passed a church building we hadn't seen before, the Remsenburg Community Church. With hope all but gone, we walked behind the building and saw gravestones! Not just a few, but many, and lots of new ones, at that. The graveyard extended in a thin line behind the church and went back a long way. What the heck, we all agreed, let's give it a try. Slowly we made our way back, checking stone after stone. Toward the rear of the grounds, there it was -- P.G.'s gravestone.

We spent about fifteen minutes at the site (big photo opportunity) and then happily returned to our car, our Wodehouse pilgrimage successfully completed.

(Whenever a book about classic cartooning comes in, I ask my father Eli Stein to review it. This time I bought him a copy of the book as a birthday present -- I wanted to keep my own copy -- to help seal the deal, and he came through. Enjoy! -- Levi)

Al Jaffee's Mad Life is Mary-Lou Weisman’s heartfelt biography of her friend of many years, cartoonist Al Jaffee. Jaffee, now 89 years old, is still going strong, still producing his famous “Fold-In” page for MAD magazine and still coming up with “Snappy Answers to Stupid Questions” and other humorous features.

Ms. Weisman devotes about two-thirds of her book to Jaffee’s childhood, roughly from when he was six years old to his high school days. And what a dysfunctional childhood it was! (More about this later). I only bring up this fact because, in choosing to read this book, I was hoping to learn all about Jaffee vis-à-vis the glory days of MAD magazine and William Gaines, Harvey Kurtzman, Will Elder et al.

As Ms. Weisman says:

Due to a coincidence of longevity and talent, Al Jaffee has been with MAD magazine longer than anyone, staff or freelancer. He was there nearly from the beginning. In a sense, he was there before the beginning ... One might even say, at least in retrospect, that given his artistic gift, Al’s mad childhood seems to have led him inevitably to satire and to MAD. For more than 50 years he has spoken to the awkward social outcast and the nerd in every MAD reader.

I was slightly disappointed that I had to wait until about page 165 of this 224-page bio for Ms. Weisman to get around to the 1950’s and for MAD magazine to finally make its appearance. But I have to admit that, for me at least, the comparatively few pages devoted to the MAD years were worth the wait. They were enlightening and entertaining.

Aside: My interest in MAD magazine is more than casual. In 1967, as a fledgling magazine gag cartoonist, I submitted an unsolicited two-page spread to MAD. It was fully written but only sketchily laid out. It was a gag idea that I couldn’t adapt to a single-panel magazine cartoon format, but I had the feeling that it would make a pretty good spread for MAD. To my utter amazement, I soon received a letter from Nick Meglin, one of MAD’s editors (his name comes up frequently in the book -- he was one of Al Jaffee’s editors). He said he was interested in the basic concept, and the writing, but wanted to assign it to one of his staff artists to draw. Since I had sent it to them as a complete package, they wanted my permission to do so. I estimated what my chances of success would be if I insisted on drawing the spread myself (absolutely zero), so I agreed. The spread appeared in the October 1968 issue, drawn by Joe Orlando. I was credited as the writer. And that’s how I became one of MAD’s “usual gang of idiots”.

But I digress. I promised to get back to Al Jaffee’s dysfunctional childhood, and the reason the author decided to devote so much of her book to it.

At one point, Ms. Weisman quotes Al Jaffee as saying “I am a reverse immigrant”. Al was born in Savannah, Georgia in 1921. His mother and father were Jewish immigrants to the U.S., both from the same small town, or shtetl, in Lithuania. Al was the oldest of four siblings, all boys and all born in Savannah.

When Al was six years old, his mother inexplicably decided that she had to return to her home town in Lithuania. Her husband, well-established in Savannah, couldn’t agree to that. Mrs. Jaffee left her husband and with the four young children (six years old and under) made the arduous trek back to her old country. She apparently made no plans to ever return to Savannah.

A year passed. Mr. Jaffee suddenly showed up in Lithuania to reclaim his family and bring them back to the U.S. Al’s mother reluctantly agreed and there was another long trek (three weeks or so) to return to America. But the dysfunction continued. The reunited Jaffee family settled in the New York area, but Al’s father was forced to go out of town to find work and he was away most of the time. After another year of this arrangement, Mrs. Jaffee once again decided that she much preferred living in Lithuania. Al was now eight years old. Once again, sans husband and with the four children in tow, she made the long trip back to her beloved home town.

Four more years passed. Once again Al’s father showed up to reclaim his family. This time his wife refused to leave, but agreed that he could go back to America with the three oldest children (Al was 12 years old at this point). She insisted on keeping her youngest son with her. Mr. Jaffee took charge of three of his sons and again traveled back to New York.

Life in America was difficult in 1933 -- the depression was raging. Al found himself being shuffled between relatives in the New York area, under near-poverty conditions and often separated from his siblings. His father tried to scrape out a living as best he could.

Long story short, Al eventually got accepted to the High School of Music and Art in New York, where he befriended Will Elder and Harvey Kurtzman. Both of these future cartoonists figured prominently in the early years of MAD magazine.

Al Jaffee obviously had to do a great deal of adapting, adjusting and assimilating during those incredibly difficult childhood years. He had to come to terms with traumatic events in his life that were absolutely out of his control. I understand why Ms. Weisman focused her biography on that period in his life and I feel she succeeded very well in letting us know some of the influences in his life’s work.

On a sad note, the Jaffee family could never learn for sure what ultimately happened to Al’s mother and brother, but the assumption is that they were both victims of the Nazi holocaust.

“Al Jaffee’s Mad Life” includes plenty of new colorful illustrations by the artist, as well as many reproductions of previously published work.